India Japan Relations

Recently, Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida visited the Buddha Jayanti Park in India.

• Both countries had discussed on coordinating the agendas of the G-7, to be held in Hiroshima in May 2023 and the G-20 to be held in Delhi in September 2023.
• Japanese PM said that Russia’s war in Ukraine “obliges” Japan and India to take a common stand on the importance of maintaining the international order.
• Kishida praised Mr. Modi’s statement from September 2022 that “this era is not of war”, and officials said Japan is hopeful that India would be more “forthcoming” during the upcoming G-7 summit.
• They also discussed on a number of issues including debt financing, food and energy security.
• Japan has also gone on to expand by launching Japan’s “New Plan for a Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP)”.

Historical Background:

• The friendship between India and Japan has a long history rooted in spiritual affinity and strong cultural and civilizational ties.
• The Japan-India Association was set up in 1903, and is today the oldest international friendship body in Japan.
• In 1958, India was the first country to receive loan for development in Japanese currency.
• The relationship between the two countries got strengthened as the Prime Minister of Japan Yoshiro Mori visited India in the year 2000 and “Global Partnership for India and Japan for 21^stCentury” was signed.
• In 2014,the relation was ameliorated further to “Special Strategic and Global Partnership”.

Various dimensions of relations between India and Japan:

Strategic Relations:

• India and Japan are both members of Quad.

• Both India and Japan are interested maintaining stability in the Indo-Pacificregion and hence are working together towards achieving that goal.
• China’s rise and muscle flexing has been caused escalation of its border tensionwith India and Japan and hence a common strategy to deal with the Dragon is felt necessary.
• India and Japan’s recently concluded trilateral partnership with Italyto counter China and maintain peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific also showcases common ground in strategic sphere between the two countries.
• India and Japan are also camping for a seat in United Nations Security Council as Permanent Members.Both the countries are strong advocates of reforms in UN and its affiliate institutions.

Economic ties between India and Japan:

• India and Japan have signed a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement in 2011.
• Japan is one of the biggest investor in India. Some of the Mega Projectswith Japanese investments are:
  • Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor
  • Mumbai-Ahmedabad High Speed Rail
  • Chennai-Bengaluru Industrial Corridor
• Main items of export from India to Japan are: Petroleum products, Textiles, Iron ore, Fish and fish products,
• Important items that India imports from Japan are: Electronic goods, Automobile parts, Steel products
• Recently India, Australia and Japanformally launched the Supply Chain Resilience Initiative. The initiative was launched to counter the dominance of China in the Global Supply Chain.
• The Technical Intern Training Program (TITP) between India and Japan also has potential to deepen economic relations between the two.

Japan has agreed to train Indian youths on its industrial floors and contribute in Skill India and Make in India projects.

Disaster Management:

• Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee and Japan’s Fujita Corporation are conducting joint research in the field of earthquake disaster prevention.

Way forward:

• India and Japan need to enhance their people to people contacteven more.
• Japan’s ageing economycan be sustained by India’s human resource.
• Both countries can together help keep China in check.
• Japan can be a source of further capital investment in India, especially has less investment opportunities now are visible for the former in China due to deteriorating relations between the two.